I like Alan Wake 2. Quite a lot, in fact. Despite my chronic and vicious fear of survival horror, I’ve found that playing on the easiest difficulty and making sure I’m surrounded by daylight with other people around is helping me get through The Dark Place. I’ve already gotten further than I thought I would, now well into Initiation 2, Alan’s first playable section. I still find myself terrified and retreating from the dark into safe rooms far too often, but it’s more than playable.
Alan Wake 2 Could Use A Hint System
Right now, I’m loving Saga Anderson’s sections in the unusual town of Bright Falls. I love playing detective and solving crimes, though sometimes switching between her actions and the Mind Place can be frustrating. I’ll get stuck, then realise there were things to piece together in the Mind Place. It’s not a big enough problem to put me off the game, because I just need to be more proactive about checking on evidence in the Mind Place before I end up getting stuck. But running around the spooky, dark woods with no idea what to do next and no indication that I should be working on things in the Mind Place is a little annoying – Alan Wake 2 could use an optional hint system considering how many puzzles there are.
Worse, though, are Alan’s sections. Alan’s Plot Board is fascinating in theory. Being able to shape and reshape the world around you by adding and changing plot elements is a great idea. My toxic trait is that as a writer, I often wish I could just change the world around me to my will by making things I imagine happen. Making obstacles disappear by changing the plot of what’s happened around you is a really cool idea, but knowing that there’s this extra mechanic in a game where I’m often getting stuck on puzzles makes me even more confused.
It’s also very cool that moving lights around from place to place can change the layout of a room, but I’m struggling to get past the spot I’m in right now. I’m stuck in a passage in a subway station, transferring lights between light sources with my handy dandy Angel Lamp, and I can’t seem to get out. I’m backtracking through the map looking for whatever it is I seem to have missed, but I can’t find it. And because I know it’s possible that I may have to play around with plot points, I’m realising that there are so many things that I could have possibly done wrong during my journey through the subway station that I don’t even really know where to begin looking for the right way out.
But Honestly, I’m Probably Just Stupid
Maybe it’s just that I’m not inclined to experiment, which is something that Alan Wake 2 requires of me. But the lack of a hint system means that I’m going to have to resort to a walkthrough, something that I don’t find myself often referring to when playing story-driven games. The gameplay doesn’t sound that hard, but exploring creepy tunnels and wading through burnt bodies isn’t quite as fun when I know there’s a good chance I’m going to be walking around in circles again once the fun, scary part is over. This game is making me feel really stupid, and not in a good way.